There’s a small community of bloggers and activists who spent the weekend scratching their collective heads in hopes of figuring out what was behind a story that came out of a little place called Beeville, Texas. Last week word came from a local paper than a fourth-grader had won a “National Science Fair” prize by “Disproving Global Warming.”

The story immediately drew skeptical analysis, as there hasn’t been a “National Science Fair” for some time. More curious was the notion that a fourth-grader could manage to do what thousands of climatologists who make their living trying to find holes in each other’s research couldn’t.

Well, thanks to the diligence of “In it for the Gold’ blogger Michael Tobis, we are starting to get an idea what happened. As suspected the notion that Earth is not warming did not beat out “50,000 other projects submitted by students from all over the U.S.”

Believe it or not, it looks like someone faked a National Science Foundation letter, plaque, medal and trophy and sent them to the young student’s family, who then alerted the principal at their daughter’s school. The principal called the Beeville Bee-Picayune (yes, that’s the paper’s name), which assigned a rookie reporter to cover the news.

The good news is one of the best video sources of dispassionate, accurate, science-based information about climate change, Climate Denial Crock of the Week, is in the running for a $5,000 grant, over at Brighter Planet. The bad news is, it’s an Internet poll that determines who gets the cash, so being worthy isn’t enough. You can help put CCoTW over the top (it’s currently in second place), but signing up and voting. You even get three votes! So, for once, I can say: “Vote early, vote often,” and mean it.